We are very proud to introduce you to B2. B2 is the third child in our prodigious lineage of world-class reverbs and spatial processors. It was a ton of work, and we are very pleased with the results and think you will be too:
http://www.2caudio.com/products/b2
B2 is a modular dual-engine, non-linear spatial processor featuring built-in harmonic distortion and flexible dynamics. It is our most advanced plug-in to date and is capable of both mind-bending creative effects that defy classification as well as stunningly lush reverbs. Its modular design enables an almost infinite variety of sonic possibilities.
It has some really cool and unique features that we think you will love:
• Two identical and independent engines
• Pervasive non-linearity and controlled randomness providing unique character and excitement
• Non-linear distortion ranging from subtle saturation to extreme bit-crushing
• Parallel as well as serial and hybrid configurations via Cascade
• Modular design that gives limitless configurations and minimizes CPU usage
• Extreme range in density varying from a single delay to full white noise as well as complex & clustered IRs
• Two dynamics modules providing Gating, Ducking, Auto Gain, and more
• Well-designed and ergonomic GUI which organizes deep complexity into a simple and enjoyable workflow
• Huge number of novel and unique Damping and EQ filter types
• Complex and Extreme Stereo Modes
• Advanced Conservation of Energy scheme that maintains RMS levels when editing presets
• Comprehensive Factory Presets and Preset Browser
• Engine Templates to facilitate preset design
• Ability to load Breeze presets as Engine Presets
• Dynamics sub-preset system that is distinct from engine presets to allow mix-and-match preset creation
• 2x & 4x Oversampling
• Double Precision 64bit DSP
• Band-limited Interpolation
• Proprietary Spectral Modulation
• Variable Quality Modes
• Extreme Off-line Render Modes
• 64bit Host/OS Support on Windows (forthcoming on OSX)
• Optional global saturation and soft-limiting for added character and color
For those of you who are numerically minded, B2 sports some pretty darn impressive stats. First let's talk presets.
1,141 Total Factory Resources including:
672 Factory Presets in 25 classes
96 Dynamics Presets in 7 classes
54 Engine Templates in 8 classes
319 Engine Presets in 12 classes from Breeze 1.1
Presets are a great starting point, but once you become more familiar with B2's workflow you will want to take note of the immense number of modular options it offers making it undoubtedly one of the most versatile spatial processors on the market:
2 identical and completely independent engines
36 damping and 30 EQ filter choices
33 Attitude types with 4 different routings
4 Density modes and 12 Contour modes
2 Modulation modes and 3 Modulation densities
4 Dynamics modes and 4 Dynamics routings
Amount of inspiration and enjoyment: priceless
Please see the web listing above for full details and explanations of all the exciting new features. There are a ton of details to digest.
02/22/2013 Update Notes:
We'd like to give you an update of our 64-bit OSX porting efforts.
The B2 port is now done and has been available as version 1.1.0b for several weeks now to our internal beta team and any customer who follows the KVR, Gearslutz, or VI-Control forums. There are currently no known issues and we consider it to be a stable release build. It is available to try today. Demo links are found on the B2 product page. If you are an existing B2 customer, simply follow the instructions here to obtain the free update:
http://www.2caudio.com/support/updates#b2
If we have done our job correctly to this point, and we are pretty certain we have, you should see ZERO functional changes compared to 1.0.0, however, ALL GUI and Systems code is 100% different. This is actually more work than making a completely new product and will function as the systems and GUI framework for all future products and updates. There are several ancillary benefits to this process which are listed at the end of this email.
B2 1.1.0b Enhancements:
1) OSX 64-bit AU and VST support
2) Completely new and modernized GUI and systems internal code-base for OSX and Windows
3) Several memory leaks which could lead to crashing in complex projects have been fixed
4) Load times are much faster and are effectively instant from SSD drives
5) Less RAM usage all around, which can potentially lead to minor performance enhancements
6) GUIs are now processed on GPU instead of CPU so it should be VERY responsive.
7) GUIs can be easily offered in different sizes
Optimized and abstracted code organization behind the scenes to protect ourselves from development delays in the future when third parties introduce new standards
There are two new additional things that we want to add to this update cycle: AAX support and preset browser enhancements to allow another level folder organization in the preset browser so that the User preset folder and preset expansion packs may contain sub-folders and total folder count becomes effectively unlimited. We are completing these tasks now. When these are complete B2 will drop the "b" from its name and become the official version 1.1.0.
Aether and Breeze will be next and will obtain all of the same benefits listed above. They are in no way being abandoned, and are used daily on the biggest projects in our industry. We will do an Aether 2.0 with significant enhancements some time in the future.
Thanks for being patient with us during this process. We are happy to provide you with some evidence of the benefits of it today, and very excited to return to new product development very shortly. We have something very cool up next for all of you!
RTAS and Win XP Notes:
B2 1.1.0b is only for AU & VST on OSX. If you need RTAS in addition to VST/AU, do NOT install this yet. This version is NOT compatible with the previous version RTAS shells. We are now working on an AAX version. We do NOT anticipate offering an RTAS version of B2 1.1.0 or any future versions of B2 or any other 2CAudio product. RTAS development will be suspended. It will be replaced with AAX. RTAS uses can continue with the current versions of our products and we will provide a special legacy version of the plug with a different ID so that you can install the old RTAS and the new versions concurrently if really necessary. This will be available on a per-request basis.
B2 1.1.0b and all subsequent products and updates no longer support Windows XP. We can offer special builds of these products for Win XP on a per-request basis, but they are not officially supported and we can not troubleshoot in any way as we no longer have Windows XP to test on. This is in line with most current version host applications. If you still use Windows XP for some reason, you might consider sticking with the current/previous generation of our products until you switch to Windows 7/8.